Backup and Burn Wii Games on a Mac
NOTE: This will only work with backup copies of Wii Games, there is currently no support for the internal DVD drives that come standard in any Mac for reading original Wii discs.
I was surprised to find the lack of tutorials on the internet showing you how to backup and burn your Wii Games on a Mac. So after figuring it out myself, I thought I would share it with everyone else. Following my tutorial you will see how easy it is to backup your Wii Game and Burn it, using only the tools that come pre-installed on your Mac.
NEW: Check out my new post on Backing Up Your Wii Game. I developed an Application. WiiOSx
http://chris-fletcher.com/2009/06/11/backup-wii-games-on-a-mac-wiiosx/
Backing Up Your Wii Game:
- Insert your Wii Game into your Mac’s DVD drive. Since the Mac cannot interpret the filesystem that the Wii Games use it will think that you inserted a blank disc. You should see a popup similar to the following. Click on Ignore
You Inserted a blank DVD
- Open Terminal, it’s located in Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal
- After Terminal launches you should type the following drutil status. Then press Enter, you should have a screen with information similar to the following screen shot.
Wii - drutil status
- If you look at the output from drutil, I highlighted in blue the information that we will need to use from the output. What you are looking at is the path to your DVD drive. In my case the path is /dev/disk1
- Next you will need to type the following command dd if=/dev/disk1 of=/MarioKart.iso where if= is the path to your DVD drive and of= is the path and name to save the image file as. Press enter after typing in this line. On my Mac the process takes approximately 15 min. There is no progress bar so just be patient.
- When the program is done, you should see output similar to the following screenshot.
Wii - Output from dd
- At this point you can type the following drutil eject . This will eject your Wii game from your Mac’s DVD drive. You should now have an ISO image of your Wii Game, and if you followed my tutorial your game should be located at the root of your Macintosh Hard Drive. That’s it, that’s all it takes to make a backup of a Wii Game.
Backing Up Your Wii Game Overview:
- Insert the Wii Game disc into your DVD drive.
- Click Ignore
- Open Terminal ( Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal
- Type drutil status ( Get the Name i.e. /dev/disk1 )
- Type dd if=/path_to_dvd of=/game_name.iso and wait 15 min
- Type drutil eject to eject your game.
Burning Your Wii Game:
- Open Disk Utility, it’s located in Applications -> Utilities -> Disk Utility. When Disk Utility opens, you should see something similar to the screenshot below.
Wii - Disk Utility
- Once Disk Utility Loads, click on Burn, you will be presented with a browse dialog. At this point you need to browse to the location where your ISO file is and click on it and then click Burn. If you don’t already have a blank disc in the drive, you will be prompted to insert one. I recommend DVD-R’s. These have worked for me 9 times out of 10
Hopefully everyone found this tutorial useful, don’t be fooled by all of these commercial programs out there that want your hard earned dollars, just to do something that you can do for free and don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t backup Wii Games on a Mac.
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Hi, nice posts there
through’s recompense the intriguing advice
This looks great, thanks for posting. I ran into a problem with step one, my Mac just spits out the disc instead of giving the dialog box to eject or ignore.
Thanks, what kind of Mac do you have and what type of drive ? DVD-ROM ? DVD-RW ?
I’m on a first generation Macbook Pro, Intel Core 2 Duo. Here is the disc drive info…
MATSHITA DVD-R UJ-857D:
Firmware Revision: KCV9
Interconnect: ATAPI
Burn Support: Yes (Apple Shipping Drive)
Cache: 2048 KB
Reads DVD: Yes
CD-Write: -R, -RW
DVD-Write: -R, -RW, +R, +R DL, +RW
Write Strategies: CD-TAO, CD-SAO, DVD-DAO
Media: Insert media and refresh to show available burn speeds
I am looking for a way to rip the Wii ISOs to my computer because usbloader 1.5 seems to be taking forever burning the discs through the Wii.
I also have access to a Windows XP laptop. Thanks for your help!
@bjensen …oh and I am running OSX 10.5.6
That’s not uncommon, the Matshita drives have been known to be problematic. Have you tried putting the disc in before OSX boots ? Also if you have access to an XP Laptop you should just be able to use DVD Decrypter to make an ISO. Let me know if that helps
One more thing I just thought of is that it could be OSX trying to mount the disc and not recognizing it properly so therefore it ejects it.
You can try this:
Open Terminal and type sudo nano -w /etc/hostconfig ( You will be prompted for your root password )
Change AUTOMOUNT=-YES- to AUTOMOUNT=-NO-
Press Ctrl+O to Save the Ctrl+X to exit
Reboot your mac and that might work. Keep in mind I haven’t tested this so I can’t guarantee that it’ll work. Let me know though.
@Chris
Thanks, I’ll give both a try.
Thanks, looks like I hit a wall. I was able to get the mac not to spit out the disc right away but as soon as I run “drutil status” out it comes. The terminal says there isn’t any media mounted.
I tried DVD Decrypter and Rawdump on the PC side but didn’t have any luck there either. Guess I’ll have to stick to the usbloader on the wii.
Thanks for all your help.
Update, I was never able to rip straight to the computer but I did get the Wii transfer working. I have a portable USB external that draws power from the USB connection. Originally I only had one of the connectors hooked up to the Wii but after I hooked up both USB connectors to the Wii it seemed to work fine. I guess it wasn’t getting enough power.
Thanks again.
@bjensen
Glad you got that working, yes a lot of times those external drives need two USB connections or come with a power adapter. Can you confirm if you tried to set the AUTOMOUNT to No ?
Do you have to mod your Wii to play a backup DVD that has been burnt on the Mac?
Thanks.
Yes the Wii has to be modded. Fortunately this is one of the easiest consoles to Mod
Hey Chris, how do you set AUTOMOUNT to No?
@Chris
Thanks Chris. Set AUTOMOUNT=-NO-, but it still spits the disc out. Saw your other post about the app you that you developed. I’ll give that a try, Thanks!
FYI, there is a program called Superdump that just came out that will allow you to dump Wii discs straight to a FAT-formatted USB or SD. It’s much faster than previous programs. One SL disc took me a half hour. Then you can combine them in OS X using this in Terminal (cd to folder with parts first):
cat 0.bin 1.bin 2.bin > wii.iso
I’m guessing that the software is one that runs on the Wii Homebrew Channel ?
@Chris
Yeah, it’s HBC software, sorry I didn’t make that clear. I’ve tried dumping over network programs and my connection isn’t fast enough.
Thanks for your good work! I have given it a try but one problem has occured
when i click “Backup Wii Game” a progress bar pops up and several seconds later it goes away, the iso is 0Kb. The WiiOSx window is still there but it just dump 0kb ISOs, my game is wiiPlay JPN version.
and a small bug, (maybe only i have this), if i eject the disc with WiiOSx opened, it “quit unexpectedly”.
another way you have posted by using Terminal, I have tried. when i use dd, it says: dd: /dev/disk1: Input/output error
i checked that /dev/disk1 is correct.
anyway, nice job
PS. i am on macbook(bought last year november), 10.5.7 with MATSHITA DVD-R UJ-868
I’m wondering if it has something to do with the type of disc you are using. Have you tried a different game to see if that works ?
Also are you using an original Wii game or a backup copy ?
Let me know, thanks
Chris
I have a imac and macbook. I have tried to do the above to make a back up of existing wii games I have however Disk keeps ejecting, even under bootcamp Windows XP.
Anything else I can try?
yet i haven’t tried another game, my wiiplay is an original copy
i am going to try wii sports and see if it can be backedup or not
thanks for your quick reply
tried, wii sports also 0kb
i apologize for what i didn’t read through the beginning of the two threads carefully, i tried a backup copy game and wiiosx is working like a charm.
sorry for wasting your time again.
Unfortunately you can only make backups or existing backups. The tool is meant to aid in making an additional backup of an existing backup game.
For example if your friend has a backup of a Wii game that you want to make a backup of, then this tool would do it for you.
Hope that helps,
Chris
Unfortunately It will only work with backups of games, not originals
It’s alright, A lot of people miss that bit of information.
Ahaan… I will follow.
Dang…none of this works with NHL2k9. Tried the Terminal commands ( which is missing a step) with no luck. Disc gets kicked out even with Wiiosx.
I’m using an iMac 2.4Ghz Intel with 2Gb ram and 10.5.7 – OPTIARC DVD RW AD-5630A
Is the disc a retail disc or a backup ? Neither the tool, or the terminal will work for retail discs, seems to be a drive limitation.
Fantastic!
After spending much time looking on how to record wii backups, finaly it’s working.
Thanks
Adios
Frank
Frank, you’re welcome, glad you found it helpful
Thanks for your time and effort you have put into this subject, but by any chance do you know if there is a way to backup retail games with a mac, thanks.
DanSalva, There is, but unfortunately you can’t do it with stock hardware and you also can’t use Mac OS X you have to either use VMWare Fusion with Windows XP or run bootcamp and use a special DVD drive.
Hey,
So I did exactly what you said to burn an iso file. And it has worked. But it also hasn’t. That last four times it has been faulty.
I am using memorex dvd-r’s. I have done all the steps, using the “superdrive”, and after it burned my mac tells me that I have inserted a blank disk.
Not sure what to do. Not sure if it is the disks, or the “superdrive” cause I when I burn cd’s it is the “HL-DT…DVDRW”.
Any ideas would be awesome.
Cheers.
Hi Chris,
Great work, hat off to you for the hard work.
On a slight tangent, is there an easy way to Scrub a backup ISO in OSX?
Cheers
Dave
Dave,
As far as I know you can do it on a mac but you have to have a special drive and use VMWare
Chris
How do you backup a retail disk?
You need a specific drive and VMWare Fusion or Parallels running Windows XP
Hi,
i tried to copy 3 wii games but it doesn´t work…
always receive: records in 0, records out 0
what s wrong?
my mac is on os x 10.5.8
Babs,
You are most likely trying to backup original Wii games. This method only works for making a backup of a backup.
Chris